Once upon a time, in the middle of the desert, there was a box. Somewhere, somehow, though nobody knows or cares, this box appeared, resting gently above the sand. Now, bear in mind, this was the middle of the desert. Nobody was there. And I mean NOBODY. Nothing, except a few dried out trees, some lizards, and a rock. And then, suddenly, this box.

It was cardboard. Nothing fancy. It was bent and worn, with one of the flaps torn off. It looked like it had once been a shipping box, carrying goods across the world, but those days were long gone, with international seals and shipping addresses slowly fading across the sides. It probably didn’t mean much to anyone in the world. Now that it was here, in this dying place in the desert, I doubt anyone even noticed it was gone.

For a year it sat there, scorched by the sun until it had grown a little bit crusty. The marks and seals across the sides had been sun-bleached and faded a little more. The scene around was all the more bleak. The lizards were fewer in numbers. The trees were even drier than they were before. As the sun blazed constantly on this little desert landscape, even the rock was starting to look dead.

The next year brought wind. Pasty sheets of sand whipped across the area, coating everything in a fine layer of dust, which was instantly baked onto the surface by the ever-scorching sun. The little landscape somehow seemed even bleaker, if that was even possible. The lizards would have died. Except they didn’t, because…

The box tipped over. The intense winds had enough force to pry the box from the spot where the sun had almost glued it to the sand. It blew a few feet, being stopped by two withered trees close together. It was upside down. In a moment of desperation the dehydrated, sand-coated lizards scrambled under the box for safety when the winds blew. The box, although weak and flimsy, took most of the pain away from the lizards, helping them survive the year.

After the year, after countless sandstorms, after so many layers of baked sand, the wind stopped. And in its place, there was a new change. In the sky, to the left of that blistering sun, there were some small, wispy clouds. Now that may not be that surprising to most people, but in this dry place, It was a brand new experience. It probably blew a couple of lizard’s minds.

The clouds didn’t leave. In fact, they did just the opposite. They grew. And multiplied. The wispy clouds became puffy, white marshmallows. These clouds slowly became more clouds. One by one, several clouds moved in, occupying the sky that the sun had once had full ownership of. Over the course of several months, the clouds dominated the sky, until, by some miracle, there was no blue to be seen. Even the sun, in all of its burning might, had been hidden behind the sheet of pure whiteness. For once, the trees, the lizards, and the box had a moment of relief.

Then, the day after, the sky began to change once again. The clouds became darker. White quickly became replaced with a dark gray, casting a dark, ominous shadow over everything. Fearing the worst, the lizards burrowed under the box for safety.

Then, with no warning, a thunderous booming noise filled every pocket of air in the entire area. The dead leaves that still clung to the trees shook violently, some of them falling gently to the sand.

And then it rained.

Buckets of water dropped from the sky and rained furiously across the sand, washing everything clean and drowning it with waves of a dusty ocean. The trees were caught in the onslaught, being blasted to and fro, the rest of the dead leaves falling and washing away in the wet sand. The lizards did their best to protect themselves, but their shelter didn’t last long.The box, after residing in this place for years, was quickly overtaken by the furious intensity of the storm. Raindrops flew into through the cardboard like bullets, dissolving the hinges until it fell flat. It was beat upon until it was nothing more than a long piece of soggy paper. Carried by the flowing water and constant rain, it was pushed against the two close trees until it had been wrapped around them, cruelly distorted and broken. Then, just as immediately as it had begun, the rain stopped. The clouds quickly whitened, grew thin, and departed, leaving nothing but the hot sun and the infinite blue sky. In the blink of eye, everything had returned to normal, pretending nothing out of the ordinary had happened. The sand quickly dried out, almost as if nothing had changed.

But to the little plain, everything changed. The lizards were sprawled on the rock, trying to breathe. The trees were shaking and shuddering. And the box, which had once stood sentry to this little land, had been torn apart and utterly destroyed. It was merely a thin slip of watery nothingness, wrapped around the trees until it was ripped and broken.

Why had such a thing happened? The box already been struggling, withering, doing its best in a world of rejection. Why had it been torn apart so suddenly and violently?

A few months passed by. The box had been the last thing to hold in water, since it had soaked into the cardboard. However, even that was sucked away as it lay there, shriveling around the trees.

A few month passed by, once again. The sun beat down, somehow even more cruel in it’s tirade than ever before. The lizards were all but ready to leave the area forever. There was no refuge, no shade, nothing.

Then the next month, something new happened. Something different.

Something incredible.

A single bud appeared on one of the trees. A single, little, seemingly insignificant bud grew on the tree. But it wasn’t insignificant. In this region of death, for what was probably the first time in many, many years, there was life.

Slowly, other buds appeared, popping up at random points across different parts of the tree like freckles, little specks of light green somehow emerging from the dead wood. The infection of life soon spread to the few other trees in the region. It was amazing to behold, even though no one was there to behold it.

That summer, small leaves began to emerge from the trees. Almost as if they were greeting this arrival of life, the trees Became brighter. Color came back. They seemed to be stronger, straighter, and thicker. Small leaves soon became large, and like most trees, leaves soon covered these trees from head to foot.

Somehow, Somewhere, the gift of life was given. And it wasn’t finished giving.

Over the next few years, amazing things happened. Small bugs appeared, feasting off of the trees and finding homes in their branches. More bugs meant more life. To the lizards, it meant food. The lizards did not need to leave their home now to find food. Now, they could eat plentifully. Soon, more lizards showed up, gathering to the source of life. The roots of the trees dug further into the dry, hard parts of the soil, breaking through hard crust and sand. Life was here. This area was alive now. And now it would only continue to grow.

Centuries from that time, people would come wandering through this place. A few nomads, lost in the clutches of the desert, seeking refuge. They would come here and find a remarkable oasis. Tons of trees bordering a large lake where animals of all kinds came for water, food, and shelter. They would find life here, freely drinking the water and being so happy that they had discovered this refuge in the middle of the desert.

In their excitement, however, they’ll miss something. They won’t notice two particular trees, sitting really close together, thick and prosperous. But if they did, they may have approached them. They may have sat by them. And they may, if they looked close enough, saw the last remnants of dry, shriveled cardboard. Cardboard that was brutally wrapped around a tree. Cardboard that held water, long enough for the trees to get some moisture. Cardboard that had caused this place to grown into what it had become. Cardboard that belonged to an old, withered box that had appeared from nowhere. A box that had, though nobody realized it, given life.

And once it was given, it wasn’t going away.

I guess life is just as contagious as death.